


Just Business

by lesbianiconjasontodd



Category: Dress Up! Time Princess, Dress Up! Time Princess (Video Game)
Genre: By popular demand, Edmund seems like a dirtbag but we actually love him in this house okay, Gen, also mild romance! yay!, descriptions of violence and some bloody scenes, guest appearance by Nino, sort of a prequel to Northern Downpour
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-09
Updated: 2021-02-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 20:27:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29320155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbianiconjasontodd/pseuds/lesbianiconjasontodd
Summary: Elizabeth Colvin is in for an exciting night at the theatre--just not for the reason she thinks.(Spoilers for Gotham Memoirs 1-10. TW for descriptions of violence and some bloody scenes.)
Relationships: Elizabeth Colvin/Vittorio Puzo
Comments: 3
Kudos: 44





	Just Business

For the second time that week, Elizabeth stood in the hallway to guard a room while Davis “helped” a friend, wondering what exactly she was doing in this city.

It wasn’t that she didn’t want the story. Sure, covering the latest melodramatic talkie and it’s overwhelmingly gorgeous leading actress wasn’t exactly the hard-hitting journalism she paid all that tuition money for, but fluff pieces were better than no pieces at all. She wanted something big and exciting, something that demanded the public’s attention, not for the fame of her name on the front page but for the satisfaction of seeing it in print. Daisy Collins making moves on her coworker behind closed doors didn’t feel like satisfaction. It felt like a one-way ticket to a farm in Kentucky.

Something crashed against the door beside her, noisily straining the lock. Elizabeth could still smell Daisy’s cloying perfume on her new dress; she hoped the noises inside were Edmund Davis choking on it. Served him right for hijacking her interview time. She rolled her eyes and, as another heavy bang interrupted her thoughts, she gave up the wait entirely. He could find her after finishing his own interview.

Wandering through the carpeted halls of the theater, the reporter blandly made notes about the show they’d just seen, sketching out a brief outline of the meager plot. In another life, she might have genuinely enjoyed the film, and she owed it to Mr. Kane to make something of this opportunity. Seeing how she’d bungled the Charlotte Harris piece, turning in a lackluster gossip article did not spell good news for returning his investment on hiring her.

“Don’t screw this up, Colvin,” she warned herself. “If this turns into a celebrity gossip piece, it’s gonna be the best damn celebrity gossip piece New York will ever see.”

She blindly turned a corner, intent on recalling the particulars of the opening scene, and walked right into another guest. “My apologies, I didn’t see--”

“Someone’s shooting! Run!” he screamed and shoved her aside. She slammed into the wall with just enough time to grab her notebook off the ground before more people stampeded past, their shouting and panicked cries followed closely by a series of gunshots from the front entrance.

“What’s happening?” she called out to a few, but the crowd ignored her, too terrified to bother giving details. Elizabeth waited for the majority to clear out before darting the opposite direction toward the ongoing firefight.

She skidded to a stop at the next corner and peered around to catch the scene. On one side, nearest the doors, stood three muscled men in long overcoats with tommy guns pointed at the ticket booth and main lobby; past that point, she spotted four men in dark suits holding smaller handguns and hiding behind plush sofas and the thick desk strewn with broken glass from the shattered liquor cabinets. Two of the second group traded shots with the first while another man soaked up blood from his gasping partner’s split gut.

“Give it up, boys!” the leader of the first crew called. “We ain’t here for the whole outfit--point us the boss’s way and we’ll save your sorry asses for next time!”

The injured man coughed up a river of blood through weak laughter. “Shut the hell up, Matteo,” he yelled back. “I can smell your dog breath from here.” He collapsed hard to the carpeted floor, racked again with painful coughing and wheezing.

The three men laughed and sprayed the desk with another firestorm, barely paying attention to the taunts of a dying man. The groups lobbed creative insults across the divide with practiced ease while actively trying to kill each other; Elizabeth made a note of their familiarity in her notebook, cutting off her previous sentence about Daisy Collins’ latest superstar fling.  _ Sorry, Mr. Kane _ , she thought after the fact.  _ I’ve got a new story for the moviegoers now. _

A heavy hand grabbed her bicep and wrenched her back from the corner. “What the  _ hell _ are you doing here?” a grave voice hissed. The reporter lurched back on instinct, realizing too late what danger lay in that direction. In one move, she stumbled backward into view of the ongoing slaughter.

The banter paused long enough to damn her. “Who brings a broad to a cleanup?” the lead man mocked. “Puzo, you dog--gotta make the last day count, eh?”

“If Frank’s sending lowlifes like you lot to a cleanup,” the man who grabbed her said coolly, “today looks even better from where I’m sitting. Nino, get to it.” Without waiting for a response from Nino or anyone, the man caught her arm again and started running.

Elizabeth swore, partly at the man dragging her along and partly at Edmund Davis for convincing her to wear the tallest heels in her tiny closet. If she survived this and he hadn’t been suffocated yet by Daisy’s perfume, her first order of business would be swapping out all his shiny dress shoes for stilettos.

Puzo swung her around a corner and stopped without warning, catching her in his arms. The ice cold barrel of a Colt pressed against her forearm where he held her, attempting to keep her quiet without actually pointing a gun at her. To his credit, it worked, though she felt more annoyed than scared by his other hand over her mouth. The leather against her lips was warm and smooth, and smelled like soap and motor oil. She felt fairly certain he’d completely ruined her carefully done lipstick.

“Not a word,” he warned when she sucked in a breath to speak around the barrier.

She glared back at him, pushing his hand away. “I know the perfect hiding place. No one will find you,” she whispered insistently. “I can take you there, but you need to let go of me first.”

The man considered her offer for the longest minute of her life. When no better option magically appeared, he nodded and let her go. “Lead the way, Miss Colvin.”

It irritated her that he knew her name already. Not that she’d hoped he would forget her already, but he’d already been irritating and knowing her name without having to ask again bothered her more than having to remind him. Wordlessly, she led him to the projection booth, taking her time in the twisting hallways to avoid being spotted by the noisy gangsters tracking them. She slipped inside first and directed him to close the door after squeezing in beside her. His gloved hand brushed against her shoulder, still clutching the gun.

She rolled her eyes. “You can put that down now; I told you, no one will find us here.”

“Best to stay cautious,” he remarked, focusing on the noises in the hallway. None of the men had come this way yet, so all was quiet around them.

Elizabeth tried to squeeze back into the booth to no avail and turned her attention to the projector and reels to keep her mind off the relative stranger standing  _ very _ close inside her personal space. Any other person would understand her awkward discomfort in this situation; Puzo barely seemed to remember her presence. Were they supposed to just wait in here all night until they decided to give up or the police showed? Why hadn’t the police come yet, anyway? There were close to a hundred people in that theatre and at least one must have had the good sense to call in the cavalry for a gunfight.

“We should have called the police,” she muttered furiously.

Puzo chuckled. “Wouldn’t do much good, I’m afraid. This crew isn’t the kind to let details like the cops showing up interrupt a job.”

“What job?”

“Killing me.”

Elizabeth swung around to look at him, quite a feat on its own inside the tiny booth. “What do they want to kill you for? What did you do?”

“Who said I did anything? It’s possible they just really don’t like me.”

Edmund Davis’s cocky smile flashed through her memory. “I can relate,” she said sourly. At his quizzical glance, she moved on. “One of them, Matteo? He called you the boss. Are you--”

“If you don’t mind,” he interrupted sternly, “I’d rather not talk about it. More important matters at hand and all.”

The reporter rolled her eyes again, settling back against the wall to let him brood. She wasn’t stupid--everything about this Puzo fellow absolutely screamed Mafia. If he wanted to keep it to himself, she’d let him, but she certainly wouldn’t be happy about it.

Her wandering gaze fell back on the projector. Even in their age of constant invention, the machine was curious; she’d done a brief piece on the model when it was released to the general public, a piece that had immediately been shot down by her previous editor.  _ Mr. Kane would have published it _ , she thought, still a little bitter about the snub. Maybe she could work some of those details into her interview and film review.

“That’s the projector,” she said out loud, doing her best to ignore the man’s odd stare when she spoke. “Someone has to operate it so we can watch a film. The projectionist has to crank the machine throughout the film so the scenes match the voices and music. We only have black and white films now, but some people are already working to make color films available. Maybe by then, they won’t have to manually crank the projector anymore.”

Puzo brought his gun back up to the door. “This is a critical situation, Miss Colvin. I’d appreciate it if you could pause your little lesson on film technology; I need to pay attention to what’s happening.”

“Sorry,” she said, partly embarrassed and partly irritated again, “I just wanted to make it less awkward. I’ll stop now.”

They stood side-by-side in silence for at least a full decade before Puzo broke the peace again. “I’m going to check outside. Stay here.”

She grabbed his sleeve before he made a move for the doorknob. “Wait,” she hissed. “Someone’s coming!”

Immediately, he pushed her back behind him, effectively covering her entire body with his own so she couldn’t be seen from the door. He’d moved too fast to have acted on anything but instinct, she noticed. How many times had he been in situations like this? He didn’t even know her and yet he’d already saved her life twice since they first met.

The handle turned, then caught where they’d locked it. Someone knocked hesitantly on the other side.

“Boss?” someone called. “You in there?”

Puzo instantly relaxed and flipped the lock. “Nino,” he explained nonsensically to the reporter and let their visitor fling open the door.

In the hallway stood a pale man in a suit and tie holding a similar handgun at his side. He was equal parts too tall and too skinny to come across as intimidating, but he carried himself completely at ease with his strangeness, which was another sort of scary. He grinned without hesitation at Puzo’s frown and gestured back toward the lobby. “All taken care of, boss. Matteo won’t bother comin’ to our end a town anytime soon,” he boasted. “Good for us it doubles as the spring cleanin’--”

“Spring cleaning?” Elizabeth echoed, confused. She stepped out after Puzo, notebook already out of her clutch.

Nino sucked in a breath through his teeth. “My bad, lady. We’re in the renovatin’ business and our boys were just--”

“Nino,” Puzo said again firmly. The skinny man shut up instantly. To her, he changed his tone to sound friendlier, but still direct. “Seems to have calmed down, but it’s probably not safe here. We should go.”

Wordlessly, she nodded, still thinking about the strange phrase. The left the projection booth behind and filed down the hall toward the lobby again, this time surrounded not by screams but by an almost oppressive quiet. The closer they got, the more evidence she found of the horrific battle she’d witnessed only minutes earlier: bullet holes peppering the wallpaper; blood and gunpowder in sprays across the fine carpet; acrid smoke oozing past the stylish, cracking framed photographs of starlets and their beaus in recent plays and films. Elizabeth didn’t catch sight of any bodies, but the red footprints staggering down several corridors hinted at the one-time presence of such horrors. Remembering her second article about tonight’s more dangerous events, she pulled out her pen and started scribbling details as she passed them, oblivious to the pairs of eyes now watching.

“Miss Colvin?”

She looked up, paying only half attention. “Hmm?”

Puzo placed a hand over hers, stopping her writing. “I admire your professionalism, but your life is in danger. Shouldn’t safety be your priority?” he suggested.

She stared at him for a long moment and closed her notebook. “I understand. Thank you, Mr. Puzo.”

His hand was still on hers. “I should be the one thanking you. You saved my life.” He nodded to the pen still between their fingers. “I know it’s your job, but you must understand. Some things are not meant to be reported.”

Elizabeth blinked back. What was he saying? That she shouldn’t write about the fight? “People should know what happened here,” she disagreed.

“If you want to keep reporting important news, you must first stay alive,” he replied slowly, like she was a child he had to chastise for crossing the road on her own. No matter how nice his hand felt holding her own, Elizabeth decided then and there Mr. Puzo was easily more irritating than Davis could ever hope to be.

She snatched her hand back. “Thanks for the advice,” she retorted, stuffing the pen into the depths of her clutch. She’d figure out a plan later writing either article when she could think straight through her frustration.

As she turned to leave, Puzo pulled something from his jacket to hand her. “Here’s my business card. Give me a call if you need any help.”

She took it, putting all her energy into not throwing it back at him and walking off alone. Nino stifled an obvious laugh and, catching her dark look, cleared his throat to hide it. “Didn’t recognize you in the fancy getup, Miss Colvin,” he apologized weakly. “What are you doing with the boss?”

“We just happened to run into each other,” she said coolly.

“It’s dangerous,” he pointed out, a little pedantic since his boss had already said the same thing. “Why don’t you come with us?”

As in let a group of virtual strangers just caught up in gang warfare drive her directly to the place she lived? “Thanks for the offer, but I’m supposed to meet my colleague at the entrance.”

Nino seemed to accept her excuse without question and tipped his to her as a goodbye before whispering something to Puzo and exiting out through the gruesome lobby. The other man stayed, looking a little like he wanted to say something memorable but didn’t have enough experience sticking out of a crowd to know what. Instead, he nodded to her and said “Stay safe. And remember my promise to you.”

“Understood, Mr. Puzo.” She forced a smile back. “Goodbye.”

The lobby wasn’t a place she wanted to confront so soon after seeing the rest of the theatre, so she backtracked until she found the side exit and left through there, circling back around to the front where Davis promised he’d wait before all the madness. Very little of her expected him to actually be there, but he came around the other corner right when the doors came into view.

“Elizabeth!” he called, running to meet her. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” she assured him, leaving out any details of the adventure she’d just had. She was about to ask if he’d gotten out without trouble when a strong whiff of perfume blew off his jacket and nearly killed her with its stench. “What about you and Miss Collins?” she asked instead, all emotion scrubbed clean from the words.

“We’re fine. Someone took Daisy away, one of her people.”

“That’s good,” she hummed, disinterested. If she was fine, good. No need to go hunting the starlet down for a followup interview. “This should make for a good article, at least.”

Davis laughed. “How are you so calm after being in the middle of a Mafia shootout? And thinking about work! You really are one of a kind, Colvin,” he informed her fondly.

“Right back at you,” she retorted with an unamused glare.

He shook his head, muttering something under his breath she couldn’t catch. “I’ll give you a lift home. Or do you actually live at the office?”

“Ha. Aren’t you the least bit bothered by all that?”

“By what? The shootout?” He waved her concern away flippantly, already distracted with checking the street for his car. “I was more worried about you getting stuck in there without me to rescue you. How’d you make it out anyway?”

Elizabeth glanced at her clutch, remembering the business card there. She debated momentarily telling Davis the whole truth--following the gunshots to the scene of the crime, the mafia don who pulled her out of danger, her part in rescuing him from certain death--but something about the way he’d asked her not to report the details prodded her into keeping silent.

“The side door,” she said blandly. “I got lost and...found the side door. Not exactly a thrilling escape.”

“Hey, one thing you gotta learn about this city--every escape counts as thrilling. If you don’t want to go home, I could take you--”

“I don’t want to go to the office,” she interrupted before he could tease her further about working too hard. For a second, he looked a little surprised, then disappointed, but his usual easy grin was back in an instant, erasing anything she may have mistook as less than shallow.

He offered her his arm like an old gentleman. “Home it is, then. You ready?”

She allowed one last look back at the theatre, hesitantly hopeful for one more glimpse of her strange encounter. When nothing happened, she took Davis’s arm and allowed him to escort her back to his car and drive her away in the direction of her apartment.

As soon as the flashy vehicle disappeared from view, two men stepped out the glamorous front doors to make sure they weren’t coming back. The taller man dug in his pocket for a cigarette and the shorter man passed him a lighter unprompted. While Puzo caught the flame, Nino commented “She’s some dame, you know? Didn’t pin her for a looker at the tower, but a dress like that could make my own ma turn heads.”

Puzo blew smoke into the crisp night air. “I’m telling your ma you said she doesn’t already,” he said and started the walk away from the crime scene, their work inside finished and ready for inspection by New York’s finest. “If Miss Colvin knows what’s good for her, that’s likely the last we’ll see of her for a while.”

“And if she don’t?” Nino asked. At his boss’s questioning look, he shrugged. “Hey, it wasn’t me locked in a closet with her. ‘S not a crime to wanna see her again.”

The taller man glanced in the direction she’d driven off, letting himself imagine it for a moment. Her curiosity, determination, and wit gave him pause every time they met, and the instantaneous reaction she’d had to learning about his situation being to save his life was admirable, if somewhat foolish. He hadn’t given himself time to appreciate the close quarters they’d been trapped in earlier; perhaps that was for the best, given how distracted he’d been by her after the danger passed. Puzo knew a powerful woman when he saw one and Elizabeth Colvin struck him quite suddenly as a woman with power she didn’t even recognize.

“If she doesn’t,” he replied, “and she doesn’t get herself killed, I have a feeling we’ll be seeing much more of Miss Colvin very soon.”


End file.
